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Below is a collection of my notes from The Obstacle Is The Way by Ryan Holiday.

“Whatever we face, we have a choice: Will we be blocked by obstacles, or will we advance through and over them?”

Every obstacle is unique to each of us. But the responses they elicit are the same: Fear. Frustration. Confusion. Helplessness. Depression. Anger.

John D. Rockefeller had it—for him it was cool headedness and self-discipline. Demosthenes, the great Athenian orator, had it—for him it was a relentless drive to improve himself through action and practice. Abraham Lincoln had it—for him it was humility, endurance, and compassionate will.

“Bad companies are destroyed by crisis. Good companies survive them. Great companies are improved by them.”

“The obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, within every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition.”

While others are excited or afraid, we will remain calm and imperturbable. We will see things simply and straightforwardly, as they truly are—neither good nor bad. This will be an incredible advantage for us in the fight against obstacles.

The market was inherently unpredictable and often vicious—only the rational and disciplined mind could hope to profit from it. Speculation led to disaster, he realized, and he needed to always ignore the “mad crowd” and its inclinations.

“Oh, how blessed young men are who have to struggle for a foundation and beginning in life,” he once said. “I shall never cease to be grateful for the three and half years of apprenticeship and the difficulties to be overcome, all along the way.”

“Nothing makes us feel this way; we choose to give in to such feelings. Or, like Rockefeller, choose not to.”

“There is no good or bad without us, there is only perception. There is the event itself and the story we tell ourselves about what it means.”

A mistake becomes training.

Just because your mind tells you that something is awful or evil or unplanned or otherwise negative doesn’t mean you have to agree. Just because other people say that something is hopeless or crazy or broken to pieces doesn’t mean it is. We decide what story to tell ourselves. Or whether we will tell one at all.

There is always a countermove, always an escape or a way through, so there is no reason to get worked up. No one said it would be easy and, of course, the stakes are high, but the path is there for those ready to take it.

Uncertainty and fear are relieved by authority. Training is authority. It’s a release valve. With enough exposure, you can adapt out those perfectly ordinary, even innate, fears that are bred mostly from unfamiliarity. Fortunately, unfamiliarity is simple to fix (again, not easy), which makes it possible to increase our tolerance for stress and uncertainty.

no one said anything about not feeling it. No one said you can’t ever cry. Forget “manliness.” If you need to take a moment, by all means, go ahead. Real strength lies in the control or, as Nassim Taleb put it, the domestication of one’s emotions, not in pretending they don’t exist.

Does what happened keep you from acting with justice, generosity, self-control, sanity, prudence, honesty, humility, straightforwardness?

Do I need to freak out about this? And the answer—like it is for astronauts, for soldiers, for doctors, and for so many other professionals—must be: No, because I practiced for this situation and I can control myself. Or, No, because I caught myself and I’m able to realize that that doesn’t add anything constructive.

Musashi understood that the observing eye sees simply what is there. The perceiving eye sees more than what is there. The observing eye sees events, clear of distractions, exaggerations, and misperceptions. The perceiving eye sees “insurmountable obstacles” or “major setbacks” or even just “issues.” It brings its own issues to the fight. The former is helpful, the latter is not.

A deer’s brain tells it to run because things are bad. It runs. Sometimes, right into traffic. We can question that impulse, disagree with it. And even can override the switch, examine the threat before we act. But this takes strength. It’s a muscle that must be developed. And muscles are developed by tension, by lifting and holding.

Epictetus told his students, when they’d quote some great thinker, to picture themselves observing the person having sex. It’s funny, you should try it the next time someone intimidates you or makes you feel insecure. See them in your mind, grunting, groaning, and awkward in their private life—just like the rest of us.

Take your situation and pretend it is not happening to you. Pretend it is not important, that it doesn’t matter. How much easier would it be for you to know what to do? How much more quickly and dispassionately could you size up the scenario and its options? You could write it off, greet it calmly.

Perspective is everything.

The Greeks understood that we often choose the ominous explanation over the simple one, to our detriment. That we are scared of obstacles because our perspective is wrong—that a simple shift in perspective can change our reaction entirely. The task, as Pericles showed, is not to ignore fear but to explain it away. Take what you’re afraid of—when fear strikes you—and break it apart.

Perspective has two definitions. Context: a sense of the larger picture of the world, not just what is immediately in front of us Framing: an individual’s unique way of looking at the world, a way that interprets its events

Everything changed for Clooney when he tried a new perspective. He realized that casting is an obstacle for producers, too—they need to find somebody, and they’re all hoping that the next person to walk in the room is the right somebody. Auditions were a chance to solve their problem, not his.

From Clooney’s new perspective, he was that solution. He wasn’t going to be someone groveling for a shot. He was someone with something special to offer and the answer to their prayers, not the other way around. That was what he began projecting in his auditions—not exclusively his acting skills but that he was the man for the job.

Where the head goes, the body follows. Perception precedes action. Right action follows the right perspective.

To harness the same power, recovering addicts learn the Serenity Prayer. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change The courage to change the things I can, And the wisdom to know the difference. This is how they focus their efforts. It’s a lot easier to fight addiction when you aren’t also fighting the fact that you were born, that your parents were monsters, or that you lost everything. That stuff is done. Delivered. Zero in one hundred chances that you can change it. So what if you focused on what you can change? That’s where you can make a difference. Behind the Serenity Prayer is a two-thousand-year-old Stoic phrase: “ta eph’hemin, ta ouk eph’hemin.” What is up to us, what is not up to us.

Focusing exclusively on what is in our power magnifies and enhances our power.

For all species other than us humans, things just are what they are. Our problem is that we’re always trying to figure out what things mean—why things are the way they are. As though the why matters.

Our perceptions determine, to an incredibly large degree, what we are and are not capable of. In many ways, they determine reality itself. When we believe in the obstacle more than in the goal, which will inevitably triumph?

As Laura Ingalls Wilder put it: “There is good in everything, if only we look for it.”

Blessings and burdens are not mutually exclusive. It’s a lot more complicated. Socrates had a mean, nagging wife; he always said that being married to her was good practice for philosophy.

Now the things that other people avoid, or flinch away from, we’re thankful for. When people are: —rude or disrespectful: They underestimate us. A huge advantage. —conniving: We won’t have to apologize when we make an example out of them.

—critical or question our abilities: Lower expectations are easier to exceed. —lazy: Makes whatever we accomplish seem all the more admirable.

Action is the solution and the cure to our predicaments.

We’ve all done it. Said: “I am so [overwhelmed, tired, stressed, busy, blocked, outmatched].” And then what do we do about it? Go out and party, treat ourselves, sleep in or wait. It feels better to ignore or pretend. But you know deep down that that isn’t going to truly make it any better. You’ve got to act. And you’ve got to start now.

No one is saying you can’t take a minute to think, Dammit, this sucks. By all means, vent. Exhale. Take stock. Just don’t take too long. Because you have to get back to work. Because each obstacle we overcome makes us stronger for the next one.

“You know what she said to that offer? She said yes. Because that’s what people who defy the odds do. That’s how people who become great at things—whether it’s flying or blowing through gender stereotypes—do. They start. Anywhere. Anyhow. They don’t care if the conditions are perfect or if they’re being slighted. Because they know that once they get started, if they can just get some momentum, they can make it work.”

Amelia Mary Earhart was an American aviation pioneer and author. Earhart was the first female aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. She received the U.S. Distinguished Flying Cross for this accomplishment.

“While you’re sleeping, traveling, attending meetings, or messing around online, the same thing is happening to you. You’re going soft, not aggressive enough and not pressing ahead. You’ve got a million reasons why you can’t move at a faster pace. This all makes the obstacles in your life loom very large.”

“proving that genius often really is just persistence in disguise.”

“Working at it works. It’s that simple. (But again, not easy.)”

“never in a hurry never worried never desperate never stopping short”

Epictetus: “persist and resist.” Persist in your efforts. Resist giving in to distraction, discouragement, or disorder.

There’s no need to sweat this or feel rushed. No need to get upset or despair. You’re not going anywhere—you’re not going to be counted out. You’re in this for the long haul.

It’s supposed to be hard. Your first attempts aren’t going to work. It’s goings to take a lot out of you—but energy is an asset we can always find more of. It’s a renewable resource. Stop looking for an epiphany, and start looking for weak points. Stop looking for angels, and start looking for angles. There are options. Settle in for the long haul and then try each and every possibility, and you’ll get there.

When people ask where we are, what we’re doing, how that “situation” is coming along, the answer should be clear: We’re working on it. We’re getting closer. When setbacks come, we respond by working twice as hard.

Great entrepreneurs are: never wedded to a position never afraid to lose a little of their investment never bitter or embarrassed never out of the game for long They slip many times, but they don’t fall.

The one way to guarantee we don’t benefit from failure—to ensure it is a bad thing—is to not learn from it.

The process is about finishing. Finishing games, workouts, film sessions, drives, reps. , plays, blocks. Finishing the smallest task you have right in front of you and finishing it well.

All these issues are solvable. Each would collapse beneath the process. We’ve just wrongly assumed that it has to happen all at once, and we give up at the thought of it. We are A-to-Z thinkers, fretting about A, obsessing over Z, yet forgetting all about B through Y.

Take your time, don’t rush. Some problems are harder than others. Deal with the ones right in front of you first. Come back to the others later. You’ll get there. The process is about doing the right things, right now. Not worrying about what might happen later, or the results, or the whole picture.

Everything is a chance to do and be your best. Only self-absorbed assholes think they are too good for whatever their current station requires.

The great psychologist Viktor Frankl, survivor of three concentration camps, found presumptuousness in the age-old question: “What is the meaning of life?” As though it is someone else’s responsibility to tell you. Instead, he said, the world is asking you that question. And it’s your job to answer with your actions.

We spend a lot of time thinking about how things are supposed to be, or what the rules say we should do. Trying to get it all perfect. We tell ourselves that we’ll get started once the conditions are right, or once we’re sure we can trust this or that. When, really, it’d be better to focus on making due with what we’ve got. On focusing on results instead of pretty methods.

Scratch the complaining. No waffling. No submitting to powerlessness or fear. You can’t just run home to Mommy. How are you going to solve this problem? How are you going to get around the rules that hold you back?

As Deng Xiaoping once said, “I don’t care if the cat is black or white, so long as it catches mice.” The Stoics had their own reminder: “Don’t go expecting Plato’s Republic.”

Never attack where it is obvious, Washington told his men. Don’t attack as the enemy would expect, he explained, instead, “Where little danger is apprehended, the more the enemy will be unprepared and consequently there is the fairest prospect of success.” He had a powerful sense of which minor skirmishes would feel and look like major victories.

He was actually better at withdrawing than at advancing—skilled at saving troops that otherwise would have been lost in defeat. Washington rarely got trapped—he always had a way out. Hoping simply to tire out his enemy, this evasiveness was a powerful weapon—though not necessarily a glamorous one.

As Hart writes in his masterwork Strategy: [T]he Great Captain will take even the most hazardous indirect approach—if necessary over mountains, deserts or swamps, with only a fraction of the forces, even cutting himself loose from his communications. Facing, in fact, every unfavorable condition rather than accept the risk of stalemate invited by direct approach.

What’s your first instinct when faced with a challenge? Is it to outspend the competition? Argue with people in an attempt to change long-held opinions? Are you trying to barge through the front door? Because the back door, side doors, and windows may have been left wide open.

having the advantage of size or strength or power is often the birthing ground for true and fatal weakness. The inertia of success makes it much harder to truly develop good technique. People or companies who have that size advantage never really have to learn the process when they’ve been able to coast on brute force. And that works for them . . . until it doesn’t.

We’re in the game of little defeating big. Therefore, Force can’t try to match Force.

You don’t convince people by challenging their longest and most firmly held opinions. You find common ground and work from there. Or you look for leverage to make them listen. Or you create an alterative with so much support from other people that the opposition voluntarily abandons its views and joins your camp.

The way that works isn’t always the most impressive. Sometimes it even feels like you’re taking a shortcut or fighting unfairly. There’s a lot of pressure to try to match people move for move, as if sticking with what works for you is somehow cheating. Let me save you the guilt and self-flagellation: It’s not. You’re acting like a real strategist. You aren’t just throwing your weight around and hoping it works. You’re not wasting your energy in battles driven by ego and pride rather than tactical advantage. Believe it or not, this is the hard way. That’s why it works. Remember, sometimes the longest way around is the shortest way home.

Before the invention of steam power, boat captains had an ingenious way of defeating the wickedly strong current of the Mississippi River. A boat going upriver would pull alongside a boat about to head downriver, and after wrapping a rope around a tree or a rock, the boats would tie themselves to each other. The second boat would let go and let the river take it downstream, slingshotting the other vessel upstream.

Remember, a castle can be an intimidating, impenetrable fortress, or it can be turned into a prison when surrounded. The difference is simply a shift in action and approach.

But think of an athlete “in the pocket,” “in the zone,” “on a streak,” and the seemingly insurmountable obstacles that fall in the face of that effortless state. Enormous deficits collapse, every pass or shot hits its intended target, fatigue melts away. Those athletes might be stopped from carrying out this or that action, but not from their goal. External factors influence the path, but not the direction: forward.

If you look at history, some of our greatest leaders used shocking or negative events to push through much-needed reforms that otherwise would have had little chance of passing. We can apply that in our own lives. You always planned to do something. Write a screenplay. Travel. Start a business. Approach a possible mentor. Launch a movement. Well, now something has happened—some disruptive event like a failure or an accident or a tragedy. Use it.

In the meantime, cling tooth and nail to the following rule: not to give in to adversity, not to trust prosperity, and always take full note of fortune’s habit of behaving just as she pleases. —SENECA

“This too shall pass” was Lincoln’s favorite saying, one he once said was applicable in any and every situation one could encounter.

Many saw themselves as mental athletes—after all, the brain is a muscle like any other active tissue. It can be built up and toned through the right exercises. Over time, their muscle memory grew to the point that they could intuitively respond to every situation. Especially obstacles.

No one is born a gladiator. No one is born with an Inner Citadel. If we’re going to succeed in achieving our goals despite the obstacles that may come, this strength in will must be built.

A premortem is different. In it, we look to envision what could go wrong, what will go wrong, in advance, before we start. Far too many ambitious undertakings fail for preventable reasons. Far too many people don’t have a backup plan because they refuse to consider that something might not go exactly as they wish. Your plan and the way things turn out rarely resemble each other. What you think you deserve is also rarely what you’ll get. Yet we constantly deny this fact and are repeatedly shocked by the events of the world as they unfold. It’s ridiculous. Stop setting yourself up for a fall.

You know you want to accomplish X, so you invest time, money, and relationships into achieving it. About the worst thing that can happen is not something going wrong, but something going wrong and catching you by surprise. Why? Because unexpected failure is discouraging and being beaten back hurts.

You know you’re not the only one who has to accept things you don’t necessarily like, right? It’s part of the human condition.

And things can always be worse. Not to be glib, but the next time you: Lose money? Remember, you could have lost a friend. Lost that job? What if you’d lost a limb? Lost your house? You could have lost everything.

As the Stoics commanded themselves: Cheerfulness in all situations, especially the bad ones.

We don’t get to choose what happens to us, but we can always choose how we feel about it. And why on earth would you choose to feel anything but good?

The Germans have a word for it: Sitzfleisch. Staying power. Winning by sticking your ass to the seat and not leaving until after it’s over.

Our actions can be constrained, but our will can’t be. Our plans—even our bodies—can be broken. But belief in ourselves? No matter how many times we are thrown back, we alone retain the power to decide to go once more. Or to try another route. Or, at the very least, to accept this reality and decide upon a new aim.

If I can’t solve this for myself, how can I at least make this better for other people?

You can always remember that a decade earlier, a century earlier, a millennium earlier, someone just like you stood right where you are and felt very similar things, struggling with the very same thoughts. They had no idea that you would exist, but you know that they did. And a century from now, someone will be in your exact same position, once more.

Montaigne once wrote of an ancient drinking game in which participants took turns holding up a painting of a corpse inside a coffin and toasting to it: “Drink and be merry for when you’re dead you will look like this.”

Memento mori, the Romans would remind themselves. Remember you are mortal.

We may not say it, but deep down we act and behave like we’re invincible. Like we’re impervious to the trials and tribulations of morality. That stuff happens to other people, not to ME. I have plenty of time left.

It doesn’t matter who you are or how many things you have left to be done, somewhere there is someone who would kill you for a thousand dollars or for a vile of crack or for getting in their way. A car can hit you in an intersection and drive your teeth back into your skull. That’s it. It will all be over. Today, tomorrow, someday soon.

Reminding ourselves each day that we will die helps us treat our time as a gift. Someone on a deadline doesn’t indulge himself with attempts at the impossible, he doesn’t waste time complaining about how he’d like things to be. They figure out what they need to do and do it, fitting in as much as possible before the clock expires. They figure out how, when that moment strikes, to say, Of course, I would have liked to last a little longer, but I made a lot of out what I was already given so this works too.

Elysium is a myth. One does not overcome an obstacle to enter the land of no obstacles. On the contrary, the more you accomplish, the more things will stand in your way. There are always more obstacles, bigger challenges. You’re always fighting uphill. Get used to it and train accordingly.

Margaret Thatcher didn’t become known as the Iron Lady until she was sixty years old. There’s a saying in Latin: Vires acquirit eundo (We gather strength as we go). That’s how it works. That’s our motto.

How To Turn Desires into Gold

I want to share with you an excerpt from the book Think & Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Using the link here, you can purchase a copy of the book on Amazon. I highly recommend picking up a physical copy of this book. However, if you click the button down below, you can get a free copy of the digital book.

Let’s get right into how to turn desires into gold.

1) Fix in your mind the exact amount of money you desire. It is not sufficient merely to say “I want plenty of money.” Be definite as to the amount.

2) Determine exactly what you intend to give in return for the money you desire. (There is no such reality as “something for nothing.”)

3) Establish a definite date when you intend to possess the money you desire.

4) Create a definite plan for carrying out your desire and begin at once, whether you are ready or not, to put this plan into action.

5) Write out a clear, concise statement of the amount of money you intend to acquire, name the time limit for its acquisition, state what you intend to give in return for the money, and describe clearly the plan through which you intend to accumulate it.

6) Read your written statement aloud, twice daily, once just before retiring at night, and once after arising in the morning. As you read – see and feel and believe yourself already in possession of the money.

It is important that you follow the instructions described in these six steps. It is especially important that you observe, and follow the instructions in the sixth paragraph. You may complain that it is impossible for you to “see yourself in possession of money” before you actually have it.

Here is where a burning desire will come to your aid. If you truly desire money so keenly that you desire is an obsession, you will have no difficulty in convincing yourself that you will acquire it. The object is to want money, and to become so determined to have it that you convince yourself you will have it.

The process that is listed above seems to simple, which is why so many people don’t follow through with it. Instead of putting in the time to write out their own specific goals and follow these 6 steps, they’ll just keep doing things the way they always have done things.

But, if you want to truly change your life it’s recommended to put aside the ego and follow the steps laid out for us by people who have done what they are teaching. People like Napoleon Hill who dedicated his life to understanding how to become wealthy.

My challenge for you is to actually follow through with this activity, and to give it a minimum of 30 days with doing step 6. It’s going to be hard. You’re not going to want to do it and you might feel like a weirdo when you’re doing it. But, put aside your self-talk and give this a shot. I’m willing to bet that your life will never be the same after that 30 days.

Now what I want you to do is comment below “I’m in” if you’re going to give this a shot. If you say “I’m in”, you are committing to trying this for at least 30 days. This is a public accountability check for you and once you commit, you should follow through with it.

Here’s a video from Napoleon Hill

Hey there! If you’ve come across this page, you’re most likely looking for a book review of the book Expert Secrets.

If that’s correct, then keep on reading. Otherwise, you might have just randomly stumbled upon a book that could quite possibly change the direction of your life.

Either way, check out my Expert Secrets notes below…

What is the book Expert Secrets about?

In its simplest form, the book Expert Secrets is about the process of switching from learning about a subject, to teaching about a subject.

We all reach a point in our studies where the best way for us to learn more and grow more is to start sharing the information that we know… thus leading us into teaching about the subject.

This book is all about how you can make the switch, and how to build a business around what you know.

The Two Types of Expert Business

Selling Information Products.

Leveraging Information Products to Grow an Existing Company.

Whatever it is that you want to be an expert in, spend the time to learn it inside and out. Ideally this will be a topic you can entirely “geek out on” and talk for hours on end about.

Creating Your Mass Movement

The 3 common traits of the biggest cults in history.

They all had a charismatic leader.

They all focused on a future based cause.

They offered their audiences a new opportunity.

Questions to Ask to Make Sure Your Market Will Sustain Your New Expert Business

Would people in this sub market be excited about the new opportunity I will be presenting?

Are the people in this market irrationally passionate.

Are these people willing and able to spend money on what you’re selling them?

Alright, well let’s get right to it… here’s my notes from Expert Secrets.

“Your results are your certification. I hereby give you permission to help people. You’re ready now.”

“That’s the key. You don’t have to be the most knowledgeable person in the world on your topic, you just have to be one chapter ahead of the people you’re helping. There will always be people in the world who are more advanced than you. That’s fine. You can learn from them, but don’t let it stop you from helping the ones who are a chapter or two behind you.”

“You don’t want to be the first celebrity in a market. You want a topic or niche with its own subculture already established.”

“It is said that in any situation, the person with the most certainty wins. I’m not talking about self-confidence. As my buddy Setema Gali says: “Self-confidence is for kids.” If you want to make an impact, you have to be certain. Certainty is what draws people to leaders, to experts.”

“People will do anything for those who encourage their dreams, justify their failures, allay their fears, confirm their suspicions, and help them throw rocks at their enemies.”

“…the late Gary Halbert when I first started my business where he said, “You are only one sales letter away from striking it rich.”

“Instead of trying to convince people that their grass is green or offering to fix their grass, allow them to follow you to the other side of the fence. That’s where they want to be anyway.”

“…..it’s important to remember that people don’t buy what they need, they buy what they want.”

“The longer I work in this business, the more I realize how everything comes down to one thing—belief. Belief creates the customer. Belief creates the results. You must persuade people to believe in what you are doing, and you do that by mastering the art of storytelling.”

“If I can make people believe that (my new opportunity) is / are key to (what they desire most) and is / are only attainable through (my specific vehicle), then all other objections and concerns become irrelevant and they have to give me money.”

“…the secret to identifying people’s internal struggles is to take their external struggle, and ask them “Why?” about five or six times. Keep drilling down until you get to the real reason they want to change. Here’s a hint: It’s usually tied to love or status—or both.”

“I want them to realize that investing in this thing shouldn’t cost them any money, it should only save them money.”

In this short post, I’m going to include the Kindle notes and highlights I had in the book, The Alchemist, by Paulo Coehlo

“But in his heart he knew that it did matter. And he knew that shepherds, like seamen and like traveling salesmen, always found a town where there was someone who could make them forget the joys of carefree wandering.”

“PEOPLE FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD HAVE PASSED through this village, son,” said his father. “They come in search of new things, but when they leave they are basically the same people they were when they arrived. When they climb the mountain to see the castle, and they wind up thinking that the past was better than what we have now. There blond hair, or dark skin, but basically they’re the same as the people who live right here.

It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting, Check out this quote.

When someone sees the same people every day, as had happened with him at the seminary, they wind up becoming a part of that person’s life. And then they want the person to change. If someone isn’t what others want them to be, the others become angry.

Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.

“It’s this: that at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie.

“when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

“When he was a child, that man wanted to travel, too. But he decided first to buy his bakery and put some money aside. When he’s an old man, he’s going to spend a month in Africa. He never realized that people are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dream of.”

“If you start out by promising what you don’t even have yet, you’ll lose your desire to work toward getting it.”

He had to choose between something he had become accustomed to and something he wanted to have.

when each day is the same as the next, it’s because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises.

“That’s the way it always is,” said the old man. “It’s called the principle of favorability. When you play cards the first time, you are almost sure to win. Beginner’s luck.”

‘The secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world, and never to forget the drops of oil on the spoon.

“I’m like everyone else—I see the world in terms of what I would like to see happen, not what actually does.”

“I’m an adventurer, looking for treasure,” he said to himself.

“All things are one,” the old man had said.

Who knows … maybe it’s better to be like the crystal merchant: never go to Mecca, and just go through life wanting to do so, he thought, again trying to convince himself. But as he held Urim and Thummim in his hand, they had transmitted to him the strength and will of the old king.

I know why I want to get back to my flock, he thought. I understand sheep; they’re no longer a problem, and they can be good friends. On the other hand, I don’t know if the desert can be a friend, and it’s in the desert that I have to search for my treasure. If I don’t find it, I can always go home. I finally have enough money, and all the time I need. Why not? He suddenly felt tremendously happy and could always go back to being a shepherd. He could always become a crystal salesman again. Maybe the world had other hidden treasures, but he had a dream, and he had met with a king. That doesn’t happen to just anyone!

When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.

“Creatures like the sheep, that are used to traveling, know about moving on.”

“We are afraid of losing what we have, whether it’s our life or our possessions and property. But this fear evaporates when we understand that our life stories and the history of the world were written by the same hand.”

“In alchemy, it’s called the Soul of the World. When you want something with all your heart, that’s when you are closest to the Soul of the World. It’s always a positive force.”

They were men who had dedicated their entire lives to the purification of metals in their laboratories; they believed that, if a metal were heated for many years, it would free itself of all its individual properties, and what was left would be the Soul of the World.

“Because I don’t live in either my past or my future. I’m interested only in the present. If you can concentrate always on the present, you’ll be a happy man. You’ll see that there is life in the desert, that there are stars in the heavens, and that tribesmen fight because they are part of the human race. Life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we’re living right now.

“This is the first phase of the job,” he said. “I have to separate out the sulfur. To do that successfully, I must have no fear of failure. It was my fear of failure that first kept me from attempting the Master Work. Now, I’m beginning what I could have started ten years ago. But I’m happy at least that I didn’t wait twenty years.”

He knew that any given thing on the face of the earth could reveal the history of all things. One could open a book to any page, or look at a person’s hand; one could turn a card, or watch the flight of the birds … whatever the thing observed, one could find a connection with his experience of the moment. Highlight | Page 110 to die tomorrow was no worse than dying on any other day. Every day was there to be lived or to mark one’s departure from this world. Everything depended on one word: “

“Courage is the quality most essential to understanding the Language of the World.”

“You must love the desert, but never trust it completely. Because the desert tests all men: it challenges every step, and kills those who become distracted.”

“When a person really desires something, all the universe conspires to help that person to realize his dream”

“You must understand that love never keeps a man from pursuing his Personal Legend. If he abandons that pursuit, it’s because it wasn’t true love … the love that speaks the Language of the World.”

“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”

“There is only one way to learn,” the alchemist answered. “It’s through action. Everything you need to know you have learned through your journey.

“The wise men understood that this natural world is only an image and a copy of paradise. The existence of this world is simply a guarantee that there exists a world that is perfect. God created the world so that, through its visible objects, men could understand his spiritual teachings and the marvels of his wisdom. That’s what I mean by action.”

“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.

Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place.

..before a dream is realized, the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. It does this not because it is evil, but so that we can, in addition to realizing our dreams, master the lessons we’ve learned as we’ve moved toward that dream. That’s the point at which most people give up. It’s the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one ‘dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.

“To show you one of life’s simple lessons,” the alchemist answered. “When you possess great treasures within you, and try to tell others of them, seldom are you believed.”

“You dominated those horsemen with the way you looked at them,” he said. “Your eyes show the strength of your soul,” answered the alchemist.

..they understood that when something evolves, everything around that thing evolves as well.

“If a person is living out his Personal Legend, he knows everything he needs to know. There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”

“That’s what alchemists do. They show that, when we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too.

“This is for you,” he said, holding one of the parts out to the monk. “It’s for your generosity to the pilgrims.” “But this payment goes well beyond my generosity,” the monk responded. “Don’t say that again. Life might be listening, and give you less the next time.”

I’m currently reading the book, How Rich People Think, by Steve Siebold and wanted to document some of my thoughts and view points on being rich and creating wealth.

For those of you that know me and grew up with me, you know that I didn’t grow up rich, and I didn’t grow up poor. We had everything we needed and a little more. I’m extremely grateful for that. The good thing was that my home town was extremely cheap to live in, so money went a lot further there than it would in many other places.

But, growing up this way I had always been told all of the typical things about money that you probably have heard throughout your life.

Things like….

money doesn’t grow on trees

save all your money

you have to work hard to earn money

the name brand things are the same stuff as the store brand

go to school, get a job and work hard

If you were born in the USA, you probably grew up hearing similar viewpoints. For those of you outside of the USA, I can’t speak for your family because it may have been different than what I grew up with.

Think to yourself for a second, how many times did your parents, teachers and others in your life tell you things about money that you just blindly listened to and followed because they were older and therefore knew more than you?

I know for me, it has been difficult to realize that a lot of what I was told when I was younger didn’t have to be my reality.

For example, the idea of working hard for money.

While I do believe working hard is one of the most important things you can do, and I thoroughly believe that you absolutely must work your ass off to develop skill-sets that bring in money, you don’t always need to work hard to earn money.

When it comes to marketing, I have worked my ass off. I’m constantly learning, reading, hiring coaches and mentors and testing and tweaking different campaigns I run and products I’m selling.

You know why?

It takes hard work to learn and implement the stuff that produces money.

What isn’t hard is taking what has been proven to work from your tests and then turning it into more money.

In particular I’m talking about finding a need in a market and providing a solution to their problem(s) and either eliminating the pain that they were experiencing, or providing more pleasure to their life by solving the problem(s).

Once you figure out how to solve a particular problem, you can use advertising to get more exposure to something that has been proven to work.

What that proves to me, and should prove to you is that…

Making money is easy.

Once you develop a skill set that can produce money, doing it over and over again can be done with minimal effort. In fact, you can hire people to do the exact steps you were doing to produce that money.

It’s not rocket science.

Although, it is hard work up front.

Okay, so back to the point of this blog post and where this idea came from..

Here is an excerpt from the book.

“The average person believes being rich is a privilege awards only to lucky people. World-class thinkers know in a capitalist country they have the right to be rich if they’re willing to create massive value for others.

This distinction in thinking leads the middle class to the lottery and the world class to work. While the masses are waiting to pick the right numbers and praying for prosperity, the great ones are solving problems.

They believe if they make life better or easier for others, it’s their right to be rich.

They’re always thinking of new ways to build a better mousetrap, and are often scorned by the masses for being materialistic, self absorbed and greedy.

While the masses are watching television and surfing the web, champions are thinking,working and dreaming of a better life.”

The funny thing is that the lottery was just at 1.5 Billion dollars. A lot of my Facebook news feed was full of people hoping and praying that they hit the jackpot and then never have to work another day in their life.

I don’t play the lottery because I don’t believe in getting something for nothing. The whole idea of just being given an enormous amount of money without providing massive value doesn’t add up to me and it doesn’t resonate with my core beliefs.

Sure, I would take the $1.5 Billion if I won. I know exactly what I would do with it as well. 70% of it would be re-invested in boring and safe things that provide me with a safe return every year. 10% would be given to charities, 10% would be to buy a few apartment complexes and the other 10% would be re-invested in new businesses and hiring teams to run the new businesses.

However, I didn’t enter to win it so there was no chance for that to happen.

Why Being Rich Is Your Right

Bill Gates said it best, ““If you are born poor its not your mistake, But if you die poor its your mistake.”

You can’t help the situation you are born into, it simply happens.

However, you can choose how you react to it and the knowledge you learn along the way and most importantly the people you surround yourself with.

Is your current friend group holding you back from becoming great? It may be time to get rid of some of them.

Head to local meetup groups and conferences where you have the opportunity to meet people who are doing what you want to do. Find people who have the lifestyle you want and do whatever you can to learn from them.

Do work for free for them in exchange for mentoring. Be their errand boy/girl and go get them coffee. Do the little things to stay in front of their minds and they’ll do what they can to help you out in return.

At first, it sucks. After a while, you’ll start to notice that you’re thinking differently.

You’ll notice that the way you talk to others is different. The thoughts you have in your own mind are different. You start to believe that, “yeah, making $10,000 a month is actually pretty easy” and you build a business to do that.

Pretty soon you’ll be around people who are doing $100,000 a month and you will realize that it is possible.

The sky really is the limit.

You are in charge

Now I know you’re probably thinking, yeah yeah, Chris, you are already making good money with your business, of course you believe this shit.

…and you’re absolutely right. Don’t believe me.

However, here’s some blog posts I wrote about years ago that you may resonate more with.

Okay, so as you can see this shit is real. It’s currently January 17, 2016 and I’m chilling in Chiang Mai, Thailand with my girlfriend writing this post.

It’s been years since I started implementing the stuff I’m sharing with you now and it just goes to show that you can become rich if you choose to be.

I honestly believe anyone with the right mindset and work ethic can become rich. It’s just up to them to actually go through with it. Some days are going to flat out suck, others are going to kick so much ass you’re going to just sit back and think “how the hell did I get so lucky?”

Over the last few years, I’ve had my fair share of both of these days and I 100% believe that it was my mindset and my belief that I will do whatever it takes to make this whole internet marketing thing work for me.

The beauty of this is that I’m able to live my absolute dream life because of these beliefs and if you want to become rich (whatever that means to you), you have the right to do it.

You just gotta surround yourself with the right people, learn from your mentors and work your ass off until you can duplicate yourself.

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DISCLAIMER: The sales figures stated above are my personal sales figures. Please understand my results are not typical, I’m not implying you’ll duplicate them (or do anything for that matter). I have the benefit of practicing direct response marketing and advertising for 10 years, and have an established following as a result. The average person who buys any “how to” information gets little to no results. I’m using these references for example purposes only. Your results will vary and depend on many factors …including but not limited to your background, experience, and work ethic. All business entails risk as well as massive and consistent effort and action. If you're not willing to accept that, please DO NOT GET THIS BOOK.
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